You have samples that are eligible for re-sequencing

*By clicking above, you are requesting a re-sequencing of your eligible samples, confirming your eligibility for our patient assistance program, and agreeing to our Terms and Privacy Policy. A claim will be submitted to your health insurance upon re-sequencing.

uBiome clinical tests are fully or partially covered by most health insurance companies under "out-of-network" healthcare benefits, with a valid healthcare provider's order. We have patient assistance programs in place to assist eligible patients with the remaining patient responsibility.

What will the process look like?

1. Upon receipt of your request, we'll ensure that you have the most up to date version of our clinical tests, to date. If you don't, we'll first re-sequence your eligible samples to this version.

2. Around the end of Fall, you'll receive a notification when your newest report (including yeast!) is available.

Which uBiome product is right for you?

SmartGut

SmartJane

Explorer

Patients with chronic gut conditions such as IBD or IBS, or symptoms such as gas, bloating or diarrhea.

Patients with the desire to, alongside their healthcare provider, learn more about their own vaginal health and how to improve conditions, such as discharges or infections, through lifestyle or diet.

Health and wellness tool to help you better discover how diet and lifestyle affect your microbiome.

Doctor authorization required?

Yes

Yes

No

Where is it available?

US and Canada (other countries coming soon)

US and Canada (other countries coming soon)

203 countries and regions where online payments can be made with a credit card or PayPal

What is the price?

uBiome clinical tests are fully or partially covered by most health insurance companies under “out-of-network” healthcare benefits. We have patient assistance programs in place to assist eligible patients with the remaining patient responsibility.

uBiome clinical tests are fully or partially covered by most health insurance companies under “out-of-network” healthcare benefits. We have patient assistance programs in place to assist eligible patients with the remaining patient responsibility.

Swallowing Door Keys and Other Bacteria Acquisition

Towards the end of a night of heavy partying in 2006, a student’s friends wanted to take him home after he’d had a bit too much to drink.

However, not wanting to leave the fun, the student actually swallowed his room key.

This act of momentary alcohol-fueled madness resulted in a trip to the E.R. the next morning, where the doctors sent him home, telling him to let nature take its course.

31 hours later it did just that, and apparently, after a thorough rinse, the key was placed back on his key chain, saving him the $30 his landlord would have charged for a replacement.

Humans swallow all kinds of odd things, but it’s also the way that bacteria get into our guts, and it’s a good thing too, as a lot of them can actually be very helpful, or at least harmless.

The process of building your microbiome begins at birth. In fact, for babies born vaginally, their very first taste of life comes from their mom’s microbes.

A custom brew of vaginal and fecal flora, including Lactobacillus, Bifidobacterium, E. coli, and Enterococcus covers a mother’s pelvic floor and perineum, perfectly placed for the emerging infant.

Some of the bacteria stays on the skin, and some goes into the mouth, down into the stomach, and then on into the intestine.

Since newborns don’t yet have very acidic stomachs, mom’s bacteria tend to make it all the way down to the gut.

Incidentally, the adult gut is generally highly acidic.

The pH scale runs from 1 to 14, with low numbers indicating acidity and high numbers representing alkalinity. Gastric (stomach) acid can weigh in at a pH between 1 and 3, which is about five times more acidic than lemon juice.

Meanwhile back at the cradle, babies begin to add more bacteria to their microbiome soon after birth.

Staphylococcus aureus gets transferred from the mother’s nipple during breastfeeding, and also from the kisses and cuddles of adoring visitors.

And breast milk itself provides useful microbes such as Bifidobacteria, which after a few weeks can make up more than 90% of a breastfed baby’s intestinal flora.

This model of “bacterial inoculation” has been well-accepted for a long time.

However, two reasonably recent studies have cast new light on the process.

The first, involving research by Spanish scientists in 2006, showed that a baby’s first poop (called meconium) does actually contain bacteria.

Previously it had been believed that babies were born with sterile guts.

Then came a fascinating 2014 study conducted by the Texas Children’s Hospital and Baylor College of Medicine in Houston that discovered bacteria within the tissue of the placenta. Their profile most closely matching the mother’s oral, rather than vaginal, microbiota.

How on earth did these bacteria get there?

The researchers suggested that they may somehow have passed through the bloodstream from mouth to placenta, and were then passed on to the infant, either through the bloodstream or by the baby swallowing amniotic fluid.

As a child develops, so does its microbiome, with new bacteria either hitching a ride on food, or sometimes via dirt and other objects (hopefully not keys) placed in the mouth.

As we saw last week, touching random surfaces can get hazardous.

An 18-month study run by Weill Cornell Medical College got high school and graduate students (yay citizen science!) to swab surfaces on the New York subway system.

48% of the bacteria they collected were unknown to science, and one station that had been flooded during Hurricane Sandy still had microorganisms most closely representing a marine environment.

An earlier claim that this study also found traces of anthrax and plague on the subway was fortunately withdrawn, but the overall take-away is that there are a lot of bacteria out there.

Strange that more of it doesn’t end up in our guts, then—our microbiomes stay pretty stable over time.

Maybe it’s because of the stomach’s extreme acidity, which tends to kill off a lot of stuff?